Thursday, January 10, 2013

Solo woman traveller: Indian dangers, Canadian goggles

I met my
husband in a Mumbai slum at a Diwali charity event. People always ask if it was
love at first sight. For me it was. I looked at him and saw a dark-skinned
Gregory Peck in a crisp blue dress shirt and pressed jeans with old-fashioned
movie manners and a wide, dimpled smile that could glamour a wailing baby into
a shy giggle – I’ve actually seen it happen.

His story of what he thought of me on first glance is usually along the lines
of: “Who is this crazy girl travelling India by herself? What is she up to?”
In fact, our relationship developed more out of his concern for my safety than
romantic attraction – in the beginning anyway. He gave me the numbers of his
relatives in Goa. He made sure I made trains. He messaged me daily. He
encouraged me to get a local cell phone. He discouraged me from taking
rickshaws at night. He dragged his laptop and work to Bangalore, Calcutta,
Varanasi. He made me choose between him and a solo trip to Rishikesh (it was
the turning point in our relationship).
Did this raise my thick feminist brows? Yes. Did this ruffle my independent,
female feathers? Yes. Did this flatter my archaic romantic sensibilities? Yes –
but in a somewhat ashamed and conflicted way.
After a few months in India, I started to clue in. It wasn’t just him who was
worried it was every Indian I met. I seemed to be living two travel tales; the
thrilling, adventurous exchange between fellow backpackers (many of whom were
single women from developed countries) and the aggressive, flamboyant warnings
of locals to stay in after dark (“you’ll get groped”), stay away from Delhi
(“you’ll get fleeced”), find a friend (“male and a relative, preferably”), or
go to a five-star (“where there are many foreigners”). I started to notice
things – news articles, friends’ stories, my own experiences – that told me I’d
been gravely naïve in my travelling mindset. Eat, Pray, Love-like fantasies
were tinged with unexpected fear and anger for myself and other women.

In light
of the recent attention being paid to rape and the harassment of women in
India, I thought I’d share a few of my personal thoughts and experiences for
the consideration of any friends worried about travelling there – especially
the ladies.

While India
can be a safe and wonderful place for women travelling alone it is not without
serious risks. Being a woman is a different game there. Period. I spent the
majority of my time with Indian women, from slum dwellers and villagers to
young professionals and middle-class housewives. For a 33-year-old single
traveler like me, acknowledging the dangers we all faced (of varying degrees)
and adjusting to it was both painful and humbling.

Every
morning, along with nearly a billion other people, I read the Times of India
newspaper. As a news reporter, I was at first (yes, grotesquely) enthralled by
the amount of bizarre crime stories: Acid assaults, ritual killings, and the
proliferation of openly criminal politicians.

But I
generally glazed over an abundance of vague and brief stories about
eve-teasing. Sounds kind of fun right? Not quite. Eve-teasing is a jargony way
of downplaying sexual harassment and assault, often very serious cases like
rape and beatings.

One
morning I read about a 19-year-old Swedish tourist taken into the bushes and
raped by two rickshaw drivers on the same route I’d argued with my husband
(then boyfriend) that I should take alone a few nights before.

A few
days later the story of a woman in Calcutta, who was lured by a job offer,
brutally raped and left for dead, garnered national attention. Not because it
was horrific but mostly because West Bengal minister Mamta Banerjee – yes, a
woman – claimed the story was fabricated to malign her government. Savvy
detectives proved her wrong and nearly lost their jobs in doing so. The
majority of the debate surrounding this story was, similar to the Delhi case,
about what women should do to avoid rape.

In fact,
here’s a long-story-short with a disturbing zinger. An afternoon outing with
women and children from the slum a friend works in went awry when we lost a
four-year-old girl. Kum kum wandered out of the amusement park, past a security
guard and into the chaotic streets of Mumbai. Luckily, a kind man on a bike who
looks for lost children turned her into the police station. As we walked out of
the station, my friend was in shock over a t-shirt one of the detectives was wearing.
It said: Help stop rape – Consent.

Men are
everywhere in India. Everywhere. On more than one occasion, I was stopped by
groups of them to take a picture. Not me kindly taking a picture for them – as
I first assumed – but me taking a picture with them or being asked to pose for
them. This got freaky real quick.

The first
time I was groped was in Goa. I was walking home from dinner in Calangute with
two Egyptian girls I met at my guesthouse. A young man rode by on a bicycle and
grabbed my bottom. I was so shocked and embarrassed I just laughed politely
like a good Canadian. The Egyptian women lost it, screaming and swearing bloody
murder. They were used to this kind of thing and to fighting back.

The
second time I was alone, in Bangalore. I was on my way back to the ashram after
a beautiful bharatanatyam dance class. The scent of fresh jasmine and
frangipani hung thick as the banyan canopies. I was so lost in love with my
thoughts of India I paid no attention to the boy on the bicycle coming towards
me. Emboldened by the sight of my arms full with bags he went for a full breast
grope. No words. I walked on, blushing, smaller than a nutmeg on the side of
the road.

Take the
Italian woman I met in Bangalore, Michaela. She was THE cliché: Dreadlocks,
hammer pants, prayer beads, mehndi and even a bindhi. On her first trip to
India, she lived with a family in a northern village and drank the unfiltered
water they did. Hospital. Six months. Nearly died.

On her
second trip, she took a private charter bus through a washed out mountain road
in monsoon season. It crashed. Nearly died.

On her
third trip, all of her things were stolen in Mumbai. Rupee and passport-less,
she accepted an offer to stay with legless beggar in the most-dangerous slum.
She did. For two weeks.

I took
her shopping to a locals mall for cheap kurtas and, facing a lack of dressing
rooms, she ripped off her shirt to try one on. No bra. Dumb-lucky.

In
Varanasi, the cleaner at our hotel ranted at me and my husband about the young
hippie women wandering the ghats drunk and on drugs, looking for gurus and
easily duped by perverts dressed as spiritual healers. He was really upset. He
wanted us to talk to them.

The risks
for good-paying travelers, female or otherwise, are nothing compared to those
most Indian women face every day. But they are there. It’s important for us to
take off our ‘western’ goggles and feel the discomfort of fear and danger
sometimes. There’s no shame in understanding, it’s the root of compassion and
the beginning of change.

My hope
is that the tragic rape and brutal murder of the young woman in Delhi continues
to fuel awareness and change for India, with the support of women and men all around
the world.

My
husband visited Canada for the first time this past Christmas. He said he was
surprised and happy to see women in so many public places; working, enjoying,
independent, safe. For the first time he felt OK with stints of us being
separated, knowing I was in here. “This is beautiful,” he told me. “This is how
it should be for every woman.”

1 comment:

Sadly, it doesn't seem to matter whether you're a 20-something woman wearing dreadlocks or a 70-something woman wearing salwar kameez. India has become a dangerous place for solo travel. The difference between my solo travel there in 2008 and 2013 is white and black.